Dial up trojans of today targeting mobile phones

A new wave of malicious dialers is hitting users of mobile phones according to experts at CA Security.

The trojans use the Java 2 Micro Edition programming language and make infected handsets send SMS messages to very high-cost phone numbers, causing great expense to the victim.

"As soon as the application is loaded, this malicious software starts to send premium text messages," CA warned on Tuesday. "The messages sent out are in the typical format to invoke premium services and land the mobile user with heavy mobile bills without the user's knowledge and consent."

Malware that automatically dials expensive telephone numbers were very rife ten years ago when dial-up internet services required a modem to connect to a phone line. With the growth of broadband connections the frequency of dialers disappeared.

The dramatic increase of smart phone use that can run software created by anyone has given malicious dialers a new opportunity. Similar to their counterparts ten years ago, the dialers of today usually dial expensive porn services. Further information can be found on the CA Blog.

Mobile antivirus software will soon be required on all phones to help protect against malicious threats.